Biography
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Gabriel Finch (a.k.a. Salsaman) is a long time free software supporter and the main developer and instigator of the LiVES project (http://lives.sourceforge.net). He has been very active in promoting the use of Free Software and open standards for use in multimedia, while doing self-supported research into freely available video frameworks and processing methods. He is also a moderately succesful video artist and a VJ, using only Free Software tools in his work."

About LiVES
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The LiVES project was begun in 2002 in order to "scratch an itch", and
provide a flexible and easy to use multimedia processing platform for
Free Software users, and also to try to promote open standards in
multimedia work. The first tangible product of LiVES is the LiVES video
editor and VJ tool, which combines elements of both real time video work
and a more structured approach of video editing in one package.

After 4 years of development, the LiVES software is almost feature
complete for its initial 1.0 release (expected at the end of this year).
The LiVES software does not follow the traditional development model of
an application (design and then coding); rather it has grown in an
organic fashion, and features have been added as they are needed or
suggested, and as the possibilities present themselves. It contains some
novel features, for example, the ability to record a performance in real
time, and then edit that performance like a traditional video editing
layout. During this development, a number of novel and useful frameworks
have been developed, which will allow for future expansion of LiVES
through a flexible system of plugins, and which could be adapted to
other projects.

About the presentation
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Salsaman will present the current development version of the LiVES
software, demonstrating some of the features which are already
implemented, both for VJs and for video artists, and describe the work"
remaining before the planned 1.0 release. The style will be in the
manner of a very visual walk through of the application, rather than a
more theoretical slide-show. He will also mention the frameworks which
have been created during the software development process, and how they
could be used for other applications.